


Highly Aggressive Moss

by sophiegaladheon



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Anxiety Attacks, Dax tries to be a supportive girlfriend, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Kira went through some traumatic stuff growing up, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-19 08:56:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,712
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10636563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sophiegaladheon/pseuds/sophiegaladheon
Summary: Kira Nerys needs a vacation.  Fortunately, Jadzia Dax is willing and able to arrange one.  Unfortunately, things don't always go according to plan.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to write something with these two for a while. I love their dynamic and they don't spend nearly enough time together in canon.
> 
> I don't have a beta, so any mistakes are mine and mine alone.

Kira Nerys was having a bad day. Well, to be fair, she was having a bad month. Deep Space Nine was a nightmare to run on a good day. The combination of decades-old Cardassian engineering being forced to interface with technology from the Federation as well as half of Bajor’s other allied systems and the cultural, political, and social stresses that arose from cramming individuals from all of those varied backgrounds into a small self-contained structure floating in space led to a bureaucratic nightmare that some days led Kira to almost long for her days in the Bajoran underground. At least then she could shoot, sabotage, or blow up her opponents. Now she has to try and ensure everyone and everything worked together peacefully.

Within the last month, the added stresses from the growing threat of the Dominion only increased Kira’s troubles. _Don’t go getting all nostalgic for your war days yet, Nerys,_ Kira thought, _With the way things are headed you may have a chance to go back to the ‘good old days’ sooner than you might hope._

Quickly she shook her head. No, it was wrong to think like that. For all she was proud of her service to Bajor, for all the good she and her colleagues in the underground had done, it had been messy, dirty, violent work and she had no real desire to relive those days. Even with the hassles and headaches of managing the station, Kira knew her life now was far better than it had ever been in the underground. 

Of course, currently Kira’s problem was neither the station, it’s inhabitants, or the possibility of war with the Dominion. Instead, she was faced with the prospect of spending the next week on a planetary survey mission in the Gamma quadrant. Which would be fine, except for the fact that doing so was taking her away from dealing with the mountains of paperwork, negotiations, and management hassles which resulted from dealing with the station, it’s inhabitants, and the possibility of war with the Dominion. After all, she was the second in command of Deep Space Nine, it was her job to make sure things ran smoothly, and with the way things had been going lately she couldn’t afford to take even a day off to go on some planetary survey mission, let alone a week.

All of which she had explained the day before to Commander Sisko, who listened very patiently before telling her that surely he and the other senior staff could look after the station for a week and that he was not going to turn down the request for her presence on the survey mission so she might as well try and enjoy herself.

Which is how Kira now found herself reporting to runabout pad C and boarding the _Rio Grande_. The hatch hissed shut behind her and Kira made her way to the cockpit.

“Well there you are, right on time. Take a seat, we’ll get on our way as soon as we’re cleared to depart.”

Kira started slightly at the voice and, as the pilot’s seat turned around, the smiling face of Jadzia Dax.

“Oh, so you’re the one I have to blame for dragging me out on this ridiculous trip,” Kira said, regaining her composure as she settled down into the copilot’s chair.

“Ridiculous?” said Dax with a raised eyebrow, turning back to the controls and redirecting her attention to docking bay control for a moment as the runabout received clearance to depart. 

Once they were on their flight path to the wormhole she added, “I’ll have you know the planet we’ll be surveying shows signs of particularly interesting botanical activity, according to probe data. There should be multiple unique species of moss and ferns to examine.” 

“Oh, good, a whole week spent looking at _moss_.” 

“A whole week looking at moss _with me_.” 

Kira rolled her eyes. “It’s still moss. And anyway, if you hadn’t noticed, I’m very busy right now, with work that requires my attention back on the station. Moss is rather low on my list of priorities at the moment, no matter how scientifically interesting. How did you manage to talk Sisko into having me come with you? I’m sure one of the Starfleet security officers would have done just as well.”

Dax laughed. “Yes, as a matter of fact, I did notice how busy you are. However, did it occur to you,” she asked with a mischievous twinkle in her eye, “That your girlfriend might be trying to arrange for you to take a break before you collapse from exhaustion.” 

“Well, I,” Kira huffed, throwing her hands up before dropping them into her lap. She paused for a moment before her shoulders began to shake slightly with surpressed laughter. “Do you mean to tell me you’ve kidnapped me to go on a date?”

“Well, not so much kidnapped as asked Benjamin to rearrange your schedule to allow us to go on a week-long survey mission in the Gamma quadrant. Or, well, yes, a date.”

At that Kira could no longer contain her laughter. “I’m still mad, you know,” she managed to choke out the words between bouts of laughter. “I’m going to have so much catch up work when we get back.”

“Maybe,” said Dax, in between her own giggles, “But the next week is going to be fun.”

“I’m going to hold you to that.” 

 

“This is some highly aggressive moss,” said Kira, shouting as she ducked behind a boulder, the phaser’s beam instead striking the tree trunk behind her. She brought up her own phaser to return fire.

“Oh don’t start,” said Dax, crouched next to her hastily packing up the specimens she had collected. “How was I supposed to know we’d run into a Jem’Hadar patrol?”

“Given how these sorts of things usually go, it’s really not that unexpected.” Kira spared a glance over at Dax. “You ready to go?” At the other’s affirmative nod Kira picked up her own pack, still firing back in the direction of the invisible Jem’Hadar.

“Right, back to the ship. Let’s hope they haven’t found that yet.”

“Oh, don’t even say it.”

They turned and ran through the dense woods, retracing the path they had marked earlier in their expedition. 

Kira swore as her foot caught on one of the gnarled roots that protruded from the ground. Unbalanced by the heavy pack, she fell face first onto the forest floor, feeling a snap as her ankle twisted in her boot. She let out a shriek she would fervently deny later at the pain.

Ahead of her, Dax turned. “Are you alright?”

Kira gasped, pushing herself up on her forearms. She tried to move her foot and clenched her teeth. “No. My ankle,” she said, gasping slightly, “I’m not sure how bad, but worse than a sprain.”

Dax hesitated for a moment before striding over and picking Kira up, pulling her close against her chest. Kira flinched slightly as the shift knocked her ankle around and wrapped her arms around Dax’s shoulders. 

“You good?” Dax asked.

Kira nodded. “Yes. Go.”

Dax took off running for the clearing where they had left the _Rio Grande_. Kira looked back over her shoulder and saw the slight flickers of movement that indicated their pursuers. She gripped Dax tighter, clenching her teeth against the shooting pain in her ankle.

They reached the runabout and were relieved to find it unmolested by any Dominion forces. Dax set Kira down in the crew compartment before hurrying up to the cockpit. Kira lay back on the bunk, carefully adjusting her injured ankle. She heard the impact of phasers on the runabout hull as she felt the craft lift off.

Kira winced and clenched her hands together into fists at her sides. The helplessness of being injured, unable to fight against whatever enemy she and her cohort were facing, was always worse than the physical pain of an injury. The powerlessness of being unable to confront her attackers always took her back to her childhood, to the choking fear and the desperation of the occupation. 

She felt her throat tighten and she had to focus on how to breathe. Her heart was loud in her ears, pounding in her chest as she forced one breath after another, in, out, in, out. She clenched her hands into fists against the bunk, trying to stop their trembling. A few slow tears escape and roll down her cheeks as she squeezed her eyes shut. She only looked up when Dax walked in. 

Dax stopped just inside the doorway, looking at Kira. She smiled softly, reassuring.

“We got away. We’re on our way back to the station and they didn’t have any ships in orbit when we left, so they won’t be able to catch us.” She moved over to the bunk and sat down on the edge, facing Kira.

Kira nodded, shuddering as she tried to control her breathing. She carefully unclenched her hands, holding them out in front of her to Dax who took them.

“Hey there, do you want to talk about it?” she asked, running her thumbs over the backs of Kira's hands.

Kira shook her head, paused, swallowed, then nodded. “Just give me a minute,” she said between breaths.

“Okay,” Dax said, “I want to take a look at your ankle now. Is that alright?” At Kira’s nod she got up, gently placing Kira’s hands down on her lap, and walked over to pick up the runabout’s first aid kit before returning to the bunk and sitting down at Kira’s feet.

Carefully moving to remove the boot from the injured foot, Dax began to speak in a low, soothing tone. “Did I tell you about the experiment I was working on last week? No? Well, we’d received these probe readings from a binary star system with some very interesting gravimetric data attached.”

Kira closed her eyes and leaned back against the wall of the bunk, focusing on the sound of Dax’s voice if not the specifics of what she was saying. Slowly, she could feel her heart rate slow and her breathing steady. Her hand was still shaking as she reached up to wipe the damp trails off her cheeks, but she was starting to feel just slightly more in control. As Dax finished up her first aid and her story Kira opened her eyes and took in the sight of her partner neatly packing away excess bandages. 

“Hypo for the pain?” Dax asked, holding up the device. Kira thought for a moment than nodded and Dax leaned forward to depress the hypospray against Kira’s neck. “That’s all I can do for now, I’m afraid,” said Dax as she leaned back, looking up at Kira with a slight grin, “You’ll have to go to the infirmary when we get back to have it checked out.”

Kira summoned up a faint groan. “Oh no.”

“Oh yes,” said Dax, carefully maneuvering herself up on the bunk so she was lying alongside Kira. “You can’t avoid Julian all the time.” She held her arm out and Kira gratefully accepted the offer, carefully tucking herself up under Dax’s arm.

“I can certainly try,” said Kira, snuggling closer to the comfortable heat and soothing presence beside her. She could feel Dax’s chuckle reverberate through the rib cage below her cheek.

They lay there in comfortable silence, the combination of the hum of the runabout’s engines and the tranquilizing effect of the painkiller lulling Kira into a daze. The pain in her ankle had lessened to a dull throb and Dax was a comforting if silent presence at her side.

“Do you still want to talk about it?” The soft-spoken question cut through the stillness between them.

Kira stayed silent for several long moments. “Not really much to talk about,” she said finally, before forcing out “It was just bad memories.” She trailed off. 

Dax’s hand was slowly running up and down Kira’s arm. She focused on that, mapping the sensation, letting it ground her. She took a deep breath. 

“I hate feeling helpless. It reminds me of things I’d rather not think about. And I felt helpless today. I was stuck back here, couldn’t even run if I had to, while you were the one who got us away.” Kira felt like she was forcing the words out, pushing them through her throat, quickly before she stopped herself. “That’s what set me off. Nothing, really. Just, old wounds.”

For a moment Dax said nothing, just kept running her hand up and down Kira’s arm. Then, “It’s not nothing. You’ve seen more in your lifetime than most people ever do, and yeah,” a reassuring squeeze on her shoulder, “You have some issues. You survived the war and now you’re trying to survive the peace. And in some ways that’s probably harder. But you’re very strong, Nerys. Sometimes I worry you’re too strong. You work so hard and bottle everything up and I worry about you.”

Kira snorted. “You’re one to talk.”

“Okay, fair.” Dax chuckled as she slid down so she was face to face with Kira. “But I, for all my work obsessive tendencies and eight lifetimes worth of issues, know when it’s time to take a break and have fun.” 

“Isn’t that why you’re here? To remind me when it’s time to have a little fun?” Kira snuggled closer before wrapping her arms around Dax.

“Why, of course,” Dax replied with a grin and Kira leaned forward to press her lips to the other’s.

 

“What happened?” asked Dr. Bashir, his voice rising with alarm as he hurried across the infirmary, “I thought you two were out collecting moss.”

“Well,” said Kira, carefully shifting her weight off of Dax’s shoulder as she sat down on one of the infirmary’s beds, “The moss fought back.”

“Yes, I can see that,” said Dr. Bashir. “Now,” as he helped Kira lift her injured leg onto the bed, “Let’s have a look, shall we?”

 

That evening, after Dr. Bashir stopped fussing over Kira’s ankle and a preliminary report on the incident had been filed, Kira found herself back in her quarters, curled up on the sofa, injured leg stretched out in front of her, and a soft, thick blanket wrapped around her shoulders. Dax was across the room, fetching dinner from the replicator.

“Here you go,” she said, handing Kira a plate and utensils before sitting down on the opposite end of the couch with her own meal.

They settled in to eat, a companionable silence falling over the room. 

“Thank you,” said Kira as she leaned forward to set her now empty plate down on the coffee table. “I needed that.”

“Hey, all I did was replicate it.”

“Still, thank you.” Kira paused for a moment. “I mean it. Thanks for everything.” 

Dax set her own plate aside. “It’s not a problem.” She leaned forward until her face was directly in front of Kira’s. “ _I_ mean it. I love you, Nerys.” She leaned forward, closing the space between them and pressed her lips lightly to Kira’s, just for a moment before she pulled back and smiled. 

Kira barely prevented herself from rolling her eyes as she saw the seriousness and solemn intent practically flee from Dax’s expression, driven out by the more familiar figures of mischief and glee.

There was a twinkle in Dax’s eyes as she said, “Now. We weren’t supposed to be back for three more days. And you’re injured. So that gives me the perfect excuse to keep you here.”

“Ugh, Jadzia.”

“Nope! No complaints,” said Dax as she got up to return the dishes to the replicator. “I’m going to keep you from your papers for a few more days. You deserve the rest, I’ve already cleared it with Benjamin, and I want to pamper my girlfriend. You have no excuse.” 

Kira threw up her hands in mock surrender, flopping back against the sofa. “Alright, alright. You have me outmaneuvered. I’ll take a break. Anyway, it’s not as if I’d be much use corralling the Promenade Merchant’s Association’s monthly meeting on crutches.”

Dax’s smile grew even broader. “Oh, you’d manage if you had to. But you most definitely do not. So how about we start with dessert?”

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading!
> 
> Most of my information regarding PTSD/panic attacks is from online research, so I apologize if I got anything wrong. As previously stated, any mistakes are entirely my fault.


End file.
